Interesting Facts

1298 – King Edward I of England and his longbowmen defeated William Wallace and his Scottish schiltrons outside the town of Falkirk. 1456 – John Hunyadi, Regent of Kingdom of Hungary defeats Mehmet II of Ottoman Empire in Belgrade. 1894 – The first ever motorized racing event was held in France between the cities of Paris and Rouen. The race was won by Jules de Dion. 1916 – In San Francisco, California, a bomb exploded on Market Street during a Preparedness Day parade killing 10 and injuring 40. The true identity of the bomber (or bombers) remains unknown. 1933 – Wiley Post became the first person to fly solo around the world, traveling 15,596 miles in 7 days, 18 hours and 45 minutes. 1934 – "Public Enemy No. 1" John Dillinger was mortally wounded by FBI agents, outside Chicago's Biograph Theatre. 1942 – The systematic deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto began. 1944 – The Polish Committee of National Liberation published its manifesto, starting the...

20th July 1712 – The Riot Act took effect in Great Britain. 1859 - American baseball fans were charged an admission fee for the first time. 1,500 spectators paid 50 cents each to see Brooklyn play New York. 1881 – Sioux Chief Sitting Bull led the last of his fugitive people in surrender to United States troops at Fort Buford, North Dakota. 1885 – The Football Association legalised professional football under pressure from the British Football Association. 1903 – Ford Motor Company shipped its first car. 1924 – Tehran fell under martial law after the American vice consul, Robert Imbrie, was killed by a mob enraged by rumours he had poisoned a fountain and killed several people. 1926 – A convention of the Methodist Church voted to allow women to become priests. 1928 – The Hungarian government issued a decree ordering Gypsies to end their nomadic ways, settle permanently in one place, and subject themselves to the same laws and taxes as other Hungarians. 1933 - Two-hun...

30th January 1948 - Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi was murdered by an extremist. 1933 - Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany.

12th November 1439 – Plymouth, England, became the first town incorporated by the English Parliament. 1793 – Jean Sylvain Bailly, the first Mayor of Paris, was guillotined. 1893 – The treaty of the Durand Line delineating the border between present day Pakistan and Afghanistan was signed by Sir Mortimer Durand, a British diplomat in British India. 1912 – The frozen bodies of Robert Scott and his men were found on the Ross Ice Shelf in Antarctica. 1918 – Austria became a republic. 1927 – Leon Trotsky was expelled from the Soviet Communist Party, leaving Joseph Stalin in undisputed control of the Soviet Union. 1933 – Hugh Gray took the first known photographs alleged to be of the Loch Ness Monster. 1956 – Morocco, Sudan and Tunisia joined the United Nations. 1956 – 111 people, including 103 refugees, were killed by the Israeli army in the Palestinian refugee camp of Rafah, in the midst of the Suez Crisis. The United Nations were unable to determine the circumstances surrounding...